The Cortland Township Electors Association is an organization of registered voters who reside in Cortland Township. They are raising funds to pay the legal fees required to get the Illinois courts to hear their plea for relief from the County Board’s decision to sell massive dumping rights into Cortland Township soil at the DeKalb County Landfill owned and operated by Waste Management of Illinois.
The Illinois Township Code was amended in 1994 with one word change and that was to strike the word “not” from 60 ILCS 1/30-120 to read:
60 ILCS 1/30-120: Garbage. The electors may prevent the deposit of night soil, garbage, or other offensive substances within the limits of the township. This Section does
notapply to refuse disposal facilities regulated by the Illinois Department of Public Health and the county in which the facilities are located. (PA 88-0062)
The word “NOT” was removed. Why? What was the legislators’ intent? Perhaps to protect citizens in the event Section 39.2 of the Environmental Protection Act was being abused like a runaway garbage truck?
Section 39.2 of the Environmental Protection Act allows the for profit and municipal corporations to barter and sell the rights to bury garbage in the soil for projects deemed worthy by the municipal corporate authority’s board. The for profit corporation, Waste Management (in this case), must first get the municipal authority (the DeKalb County Board) to approve a Host Fee Agreement that provides substantial alternative to tax revenues based on a per ton of garbage tipping fee.
The margin for error in this poll stinks. But it is as neutral as this
“To Whom It May Concern” resolution
from the Cortland Township Board of Trustees.
Other municipal corporations (Town of Cortland) can be negotiated with to arrange one time cash payments and other considerations in exchange for not opposing or assisting anyone who might oppose the proposed landfill expansion.
Once the Host Fee Agreement is approved ex-parte communications is invoked on the elected county board members. They are not allowed to talk to anyone who has any interest in the landfill proposal — not Waste Management or their constituents. The county board must then appoint a committee of quasi-judicial board members to attend a grueling public hearing lasting more than a week completely paid for by the applicant including all legal fees except of those who might object to the proposal. The applicant pays for expert witnesses who testify on their client’s behalf.
The quasi-judicial elected county board must then weigh only the evidence presented at the above described public hearing to determine if the proposal met all nine criteria provided for in Section 39.2 of the Illinois Protection Act. One of the criteria, the first one in fact, requires that the applicant demonstrates that the expansion meets the needs the landfill serves. Until the Host Fee Agreement was approved the landfill served DeKalb County except for 10% allowed for out of county waste (300-some tons daily). The Host Fee Agreement provided Waste Management with the rights to bury 2,000 plus tons a day from 17 northern Illinois counties including Cook in the DeKalb County Landfill. Before hearing from a single expert witness the DeKalb County Board approved meeting Chicagoland’s waste burial needs. That’s how the tipping fees become substantial.
In the rush and struggle to latch on to some of the tipping fees for their favorite projects the board members never considered why those living in the 17 other counties didn’t want their garbage buried near their backyards. Besides none of the county board members lived that close to the landfill, either.
Pursuant to the Illinois Township Code, at a March 18, 2010 special meeting, the Cortland Township Electors adopted a resolution denying the landfill siting expansion. At a special meeting held January 31, 2013, Cortland Township Electors voted to proceed with legal action to enforce their resolution to deny the expansion.
At the January 31 meeting, Jeff Jeep, a partner in the law firm of Jeep & Blazer, LLC spoke. He has more than 30 years experience in environmental law and as in-house counsel for Waste Management, Inc. (WMI) from 1985 to 1994, he had responsibility for literally hundreds of Superfund Sites.
Jeep & Blazer represented the City of Waukegan in an action by the City challenging the effort by the Sanitary District to build a sewage sludge incinerator on the City’s lakefront. The City obtained both a temporary restraining order and then a preliminary injunction barring the construction of the subject facility. The trial court’s decision was subsequently affirmed by the Illinois Appellate Court in City of Waukegan v. Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, 339 Ill.App.3d 963 (2nd Dist. 2003). The Sanitary District thereafter abandoned its effort to build the facility in Waukegan.
The firm also represented the Village of Glendale Heights in opposition to an application for local siting approval, in Carol Stream, of a solid waste transfer station. Following three weeks of public hearings, the Carol Stream Village Board unanimously denied the siting application. Note: the Town of Cortland did not attend or participate in the DeKalb County landfill siting application hearing. Would it have made any difference? We’ll never know.
Section 39.2 of the Environmental Protection Act seems to protect landfill siting applicants from the public. The Illinois Township Code appears to protect residents from landfill siting applicants. Judges make a decent living. They ought to consider this contrast and its legal and constitutional ramifications.
The crying shame is that citizens of Cortland Township are asked to raise up to $60,000 through private or public sources to get the courts to mitigate a clear conflict in statutes.
The irony is their case will set precedence for all other townships in Illinois. Should Cortland Township Electors prevail there might be similar action throughout the state. That’s how grassroots citizens can force their governments and corporations to set deadlines for progressing from burying garbage (knowing there are consequences we do not understand) to advancing, cleaner, healthier and more productive technologies in recycling and waste to energy.
HERE’S HOW TO HELP:
Make checks payable to CTEA. Send to 18711 Chase Rd., DeKalb, IL. Include the name of the donor, address and phone number.
If you’d like to give anonymously, please call 815-766-0667.
Time is of the essence!!
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